Other Versions

Income Tax Raid at Bhai Thakur’s Office and Home Recovered Thousands of CroresIncome Tax Raid at Bhai Thakur’s Office and Home Recovered Thousands of Crores

Analysis:

The message shared widely online by Indians and others states that an Income Tax raid conducted in Virar, Mumbai (India) at Bhai Thakur’s (Jayendra Thakur) office & home has recovered more than 13,000 Crore rupees. Some versions of the message also called it as the biggest ever seizure in an IT raid! Let us analyze the facts about the said incident.

Bhai Thakur

Times of India Reports

On 13 August 2014, The Times of India (Mumbai) reported about the aftermath of an income tax department raid conducted on a group of builders in the Vasai-Virar region of Mumbai two weeks earlier. Accordingly, the Thane unit of the IT department raided Ameya Builders, Swastik Group and its partner Rajiv Patil, along with the first mayor of the Vasai-Virar Municipal Corporation and a relative (kin) of former MLA Hitendra Thakur. (Note that Bhai Thakur is elder brother of Hitendra Thakur. More on this later) The IT department seized cash and jewellery worth Rs 5.5 Crore in the raids at over 50 premises, an official said. It is also reported that following the raid, a group of builders admitted to concealment of Rs 390-crore earnings.

Notably, the officials said that the tax evasion was by way of manipulation of land deals where Thakur’s Viva Group’s role has emerged.

Viva Group

Viva Group is a multifaceted business conglomerate, which on their website describes itself as ‘one of the largest land aggregators in Mumbai, India‘. Viva Homes is run by Jayendra Bhai Thakur’s son Rohan Jaye Thakur, and Bhai Thakur’s nephew Siddharth is a Viva Group director. There’s a belief that the company is backed by Bhai Thakur. Viva group has various business interests and also has a trust that runs many educational institutions in the Vasai-Virar region. According to an official, “Thakur’s trust has facilitated several land transactions. Prima facie, the complicity of the trust in changing the user status of the land procured for educational purposes and selling it for commercial purposes has emerged“.

There’s no major news coverage on the IT raid, perhaps because Bhai Thakur has a criminal background.

Gangster with Criminal Background

Jayendra alias Bhai Thakur is the elder brother of politician and chairman of regional political party Bahujan Vikas Aaghadi (BVA), Hitendra Thakur, a former MLA. As reported in an archive of Tehelka.com, Bhai Thakur is a local landing agent in Mumbai, whose men are scattered in every village in the Vasai-Virar belt. He lost an eye in attack by a rival Virar gang. An article in MumbaiMirror.com points that Jayendra Bhai Thakur has several murder, extortion, and land grabbing cases against him. He came into limelight in the 1980s when the Vasai-Virar and Naigaon belts were booming, and was sentenced to death for a 1992 shootout at JJ Hospital (TADA case), but the Supreme Court reduced his sentence to life in prison.

After being in jail for seven years, the gangster Jayendra Vishnu Thakur alias ‘Bhai Thakur’ was granted bail in Feb. 2007. It is said that Bhai Thakur parted company with Dawood Ibrahim post-Bombay blasts, and even joined Chhota Rajan. Bhai Thakur was also the prime accused in the murders of activist Navleen Kumar and developer Suresh Dube, who tried to stop Thakur from grabbing adivasi land.

Big Fat Wedding

In December 2013, Jayendra Bhai Thakur held a big fat wedding of his daughter Priyanka Thakur. The grand wedding reception that was held at VIVA Melange ground covering an area of 1.5 lakh sq ft (apart from parking zones) witnessed more than 10,000 guests (including noted politicians and actors), flowers from across the world and choppers to ferry VIPs.

It is often said that Bhai Thakur has many politicians on his payroll. All this is conclusive of saying that the gangster Bhai Thakur is very wealthy, apart from being influential.

About Pictures

The many pictures of hefty piles of cash and income tax officials that come with the stories of this IT raid in Vasai-Virar region of Mumbai are, in fact, old ones not related to the present raid.

In Conclusion

It is a fact that the Thane unit of the IT department conducted a raid on a group of builders in the Vasai-Virar region of Mumbai, which also included a relative (kin) of former MLA Hitendra Thakur, the younger brother of Jayendra ‘Bhai’ Thakur. The Times of India reported that in all these raids, IT department seized cash and jewellery worth Rs 5.5 Crore, and later, a group of builders even admitted to concealment of Rs 390-crore earnings. So the exact amount of money laundering (related to Bhai Thakur) cannot be known for now.